Old Pond Publishing

August 2012

08/24/2012

Eddie Stobart: Trucks and Trailers Series 3. 4-DVD set, approx 405 minutes. Available now from Old Pondat £19.95.

The popular observational documentary series featuring iconic haulage firm Eddie Stobart returns with more action packed adventures featuring their fans’ favourite truckers.EPISODE 1Hazards are never far away as driver Lee finds out to his cost when he tries to move a London landmark, the famous Piccadilly lights, and it’s red alert for Tim Fox when his brand-new biomass trailer goes missing.EPISODE 2In this episode, 20 young lads compete to win 10 places on the firm’s coveted apprenticeship scheme. Seasoned pro Tim Fox battles his biomass juggernaut on the motorway, delivering recyclable garden waste in dangerously high winds, while two unlucky passengers come unstuck at London Southend Airport as Stobart attempt to conquer the airways in their latest £100 million venture.EPISODE 3One of Stobart s most unusual trucks, the 25 ton Tellytubby , with its 27 metre built-in-screen, is booked for a three-day charity supercar event in Ireland. Tellytubby is tasked with replaying the day’s racing highlights, but first it must make it to the finishing line before any one else.EPISODE 4The iconic green and red wagons are back on the road and getting even greener as biomass driver Tim Fox heads to a recycling plant to collect a load of recycled sawdust destined for a cattle farm, but bad drivers, traffic jams, vague directions and tight squeezes soon tax his temper.EPISODE 5The rail freight division steams into action helping deliver fifty thousand bottles of Scotland’s most popular soft drink south of the border, and it’s a race against time unloading them at the rail terminal in Daventry as a breakdown in communications threatens to bring operations to a halt.EPISODE 6Driver Fiona has a trucking nightmare as she struggles to gets to grips with making deliveries to Bolton supermarkets in a new urban trailer she’s never used before, and it’s no laughing matter for trucker Eddie Murphy who’s all at sea picking up containers from Felixstowe docks.EPISODE 7The wheels keep turning for Britain’s iconic haulage firm Eddie Stobart, and in this episode Harry Hill lookalike trucker Kevin Durcan gets an eyeful on the graveyard shift in Liverpool city centre and makes a mercy dash to aid a member of the public.EPISODE 8In the last episode of the third series, it’s Wales v England in a truck off as drivers Ashley Maddox and Mark Dixon race to deliver new turf for the pitch at Cardiff’s Millennium stadium, but Mark proves an early casualty when he gets stuck in the mud.EDDIE STOBART’S CHRISTMAS DELIVERYA one-off special from Eddie Stobart, delivering Christmas to the nation in the biggest event of the trucking year. The guys and girls in the famous green and red wagons are relentlessly working round the clock 24-7, making 9,000 deliveries daily to bring home our festive cheer. Long-haul driver Ashley is embarking on a 500 mile journey from Yorkshire to a remote whiskey distillery on Islay, an island off the west coast of Scotland, to collect 700 bottles of whiskey destined for the mainland.

Jack Byard’s research into the endangered breeds of sheep, goats, cattle, pigs, horses and poultry in Britain has revealed many interesting facts about them. The Gloucester cow, for example, now reduced to just 750 breeding females, has records going back to the thirteenth century. In 1796 it was a Gloucester cow called Blossom who provided the first serum for a smallpox vaccine.

Broadly following the watchlist produced by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust, Jack has chosen forty-four examples of threatened breeds. Each has a full-page photograph faced on the opposite page by an account of the breed’s history, current status and an idea of its food or amenity value.

The book is ideal for novice enthusiasts of any age. Jack passionately hopes that readers will appreciate the value of these animals and birds and be inspired to support efforts for their preservation.

Author Jack Byard was born in Bradford where he has lived and worked all his life. A Rolls-Royce craftsman by trade and a jewellery craftsman in later years, Jack spent the latter part of his working life imparting this knowledge as a school workshop technician.

Jack has always had a deep affection for his rural heritage and so wrote his first book, Know Your Sheep, with a view to sharing with others the countryside that he loves. Know Your Rare Breeds is his tenth title. A complete list can be seen on the Know Your … section of the Old Pond website.

The new DVD Modern Tractors 3 'Out in the Fields' by Stephen Richmond and Jonathan Whitlam of Tractor Barn has now been released at £16.95 inc. VAT. Information and online ordering from the Old Pond website are here.

08/03/2012

Ken Stewart died peacefully at home on 24 July. He was ninety years old.

I first met him in 1976 when I was editing a series of self-sufficiency books called ‘Invest in Living’. We were told that the person whose advice had to be sought about what backyard farming books were already in the market and what would sell was Ken Stewart. I caught up with him on the Landsmans stand at the Harrogate spring fair. He was tall, courteous and full of helpful information, not least about the need for good covers.

The second time we met was in December 1979. Ken’s courtesy was being stretched at the Smithfield Show by an argument with Philip Wood, then books manger at Farming Press. In fact this was a blazing row sparked by Philip discounting the price of books on his stand to undercut Landsmans who were Farming Press’s major British retailer. Ken told him exactly what he thought about it.

When I got to know Ken better I appreciated his friendship and knowledge, and understood why he had such a pride in the company he had developed with his cousin Jane Young. They ran bookstalls at all the major farming and gardening events; their trailer toured agricultural colleges, and they issued an annual catalogue of 5,000 titles which was the trade’s bible. He had joined Landsmans from the airforce and he was also a keen sailor.

When Ken moved towards retirement Landsman continued to be run by his son, Peter, and Jane Young’s son, Keith. Ken finally liquidated the company in 2008, as reported here.

Ken is survived by six children, fifteen grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

08/02/2012

Steven Vale has now started preparing a second Demolition Giants DVD. In early July we were filming at the site of the Kidderminster sugar beet factory. DSM Demolition had two Hitachis in action, an EX1200 with a 60-foot Kocurek conversion and a 670LCH reaching to 23 feet.

Extended to about 55 feet and mounted on a ramp for extra height, the 1200 was reducing the tower beside one of the two silos.

The cab of the 1200 tilted to give the operator a clear view.

One of the silos was partially demolished, leaving the 670 to finish the job.

The plant, which opened in 1925, was closed in 2002, a victim of the restructuring and reduction of the UK’s beet output as part of the EU sugar regime. The buildings stand quite near a car showroom and light industrial businesses, so DSM has had dust control as a priority.

The rest of the 74-acre site has been cleared, with only the silos to go – a three-week job for DSM. After clearance the St Francis Group will begin the first phase of redevelopment including 200 houses, a medical centre, shops and a major link road.

Pete Connock and Martin Phippard have captured three very different types of abnormal load movements in the UK.

The first film, Deep Pile, follows the movement of a 50-metre-long, 170-tonne steel pile from the Chepstow plant of manufacturer Mabey Bridge to the docks at Avonmouth. We see the Collett Group securing the self-supporting load aboard two modules, leaving the factory and then crossing the new Severn Bridge. Motive power is provided by two MAN four-axle prime movers, a V10-powered TGA and V8-powered TGX.

In the second feature, Kolossal Komatsu the CPP team capture the marriage of the body to the chassis of a huge Komatsu 785 dump truck prior to its delivery to a busy Hanson Aggregates quarry in the Mendip Hills. This sequence shows the problems associated with carrying such a big machine along the lanes of Somerset. It is supplemented by a short but exciting few minutes in which several Komatsu 785s are seen at work in the quarry.

The final story is a record of the movement of a massive quad-booster from the Alstom factory in Stafford to an electricity generating station near Preston. Power to the People not only shows the 500-tonne combination moving over the road network but also depicts the ship-to-shore transfer of the complete vehicle from the marine vessel Terra Marique. Allelys Heavy Haulage completed the move using ballasted MAN and DAF prime movers and an enormous girder trailer.

Pete Connock and Martin Phippard have been making trucking programmes for nearly twenty years. Their DVDs are fully researched and narrated and aimed squarely at fellow trucking enthusiasts.